It didn’t take long to get back home on a very familiar drive back. It was a little strange being driven around in my own car, but I wasn’t exactly unhappy about the person doing it. Liz was very much a welcome addition to my day. 

Shopping with her had been a lot of fun. Our interactions were still a bit awkward, yet there was a distinct feeling of rightness to being around her that I would hesitate to describe as anything more than a crush at the moment. It’s hardly fair, bowling me straight into someone who shares a magical compatibility -in the actual magical sense- and then not being able to act on it because of the circumstance.

My conscience is telling me that I should maintain a respectable distance in regards to Liz and I suddenly becoming somewhat… entangled. In a more figurative sense than some other part of my brain is trying to insinuate. We have known each other for two whole days. Well, not even two full days. That is not enough time to know anything about a person. It wouldn’t be responsible to suddenly pounce on some crush that has an obligation to be around you. No matter how much a certain other voice says pouncing is a good thing. That voice is kept firmly encased in horny jail.

During this contemplative event, Liz and I had pulled into the garage of my home and started unloading the car. Bags, boxes, and bags upon bags upon bags. In short order, the car was emptied and the kitchen island was covered in groceries while the couch took the brunt of the clothes and other things that needed to go to my room. The boxes with the furniture to be put in the guest room, about to be Liz’s room, sat next to the couch. 

With the both of us working at putting things away, the groceries were stowed respectively into the fridge and pantry. Next was the clothing and such, which I was able to get into my room just fine in a single trip to heap onto the bed to be sorted into my closet, dresser, and vanity later. Lastly was the furniture, which was similarly quick to be brought up with two trips from Liz and myself.

Finally, everything was put where it was meant to be. For now. Clothing still needed putting up and furniture assembled, but that was for later. Now it was lunch time, noon o’clock. 

“Okay, let’s get some food. After we eat we can get your room put together.” I declared to Liz as we stood in the empty room that would soon be an actual bedroom. 

Liz didn’t have any words of complaint, though she did give me a look that I couldn’t exactly place when I called it her room, so we made our way to the kitchen where I went about the process of getting lunch ready. 

Since we had so much that was going to need to be done today, I had decided to get something easy for lunch. Rotisserie chicken from the deli and some fresh produce made a simple enough prep. Taking a note from Delilah’s cookbook of making some sandwiches for lunch, I got to cutting some chicken. Liz happily lent a hand as well, grabbing a second cutting board and knife to work at the tomatoes and lettuce.

The two of us made quick work of the prep, only taking a couple of minutes before everything was ready to be plated and the remainder of what we didn’t use got packed away into the fridge for later. 

Due to the increase in appetite that came with becoming a Were, I had gotten enough for us to make two loaded sandwiches apiece. Plenty of meat and veggies, and then some cheese slices and condiments to round it out. Liz and I each got a couple slices of swiss cheese, but while I put some mayo on my sandwich Liz went with a mustard that she picked out while we were at the store. Some kind of specialty mustard? It seems like it should be pretty good though since the bottle was like twelve bucks for the small-ish bottle it came in. At least I hoped it was good for being that expensive.

We sat down at the table in the dining room with our sandwiches and some lemonade that we poured for ourselves. It didn’t take all that long to polish off both hefty sandwiches. Neither of us really had much to say, putting our focus on the meal so that we could move on to the next thing we would have to tackle today.

Surprisingly, I didn’t feel overly full or bloated after any of these large meals from the past couple days. I wasn’t especially hungry beforehand, simply eating what was available in front of me without any starving fervor. And after I had eaten I felt… not full, but satisfied. I knew that I could probably eat more, though it bore the question of how much room I even had in my stomach. Maybe I could ask Liz later? That among a dozen other questions about how my body works now.

That line of thought was for later. For now, I started over to the kitchen to clean up. Typically I wash dishes by hand since it’s just me and I don’t have much to clean in a day. Given the stuff left to do today though, I figured that making use of the dishwasher would be worthwhile. Especially since I’ll be cooking for two now. 

My heart thumped against my chest at the thought of cooking for Liz. Oh how unfair it is to be in a position where I get to cook for, go shopping with, and live with my crush and yet have so much baggage attached to the situation that there is no way anything can come of it. Is this what being an anime protagonist feels like? 

“Sam?” came a voice from beside me, nearly causing me to drop the plate I was holding out of surprise. “You okay?”

To my right was Liz with a concerned expression aimed at me. It seems that as my mind was wandering I had just stood there holding a plate for longer than would likely be considered healthy. I blushed and looked away. “Yeah, just um… a lot on my mind right now I guess? I was lost in thought.” 

Liz continued to look at me for a moment longer, then turned away and sighed while placing her plate on the rack of the dishwasher. “If you have questions, I can probably answer a lot of them. I don’t know as much as my parents, but I should know enough to help things make sense.”

I struggled for a moment on the fact that I wasn’t even thinking about any of the magic stuff, I was thinking about shamelessly crushing on the girl that was practically forced to move in with me for my own safety. I wasn’t ready to deal with that at all, so I quickly spouted the first thing that came to mind. “I uh, have to eat more than I used to. Are there any dietary requirements that I should be aware of?”

Liz raised an eyebrow, not answering immediately. The eyebrow came back down and she answered confidently, “No, you can pretty much forget what you know about nutrition. You don’t even need to eat, technically, but eating does make a Were healthier in a way. Better than letting your body maintain itself off of nothing. Doesn’t matter what you eat either, so long as it’s something organic.” She winces, then corrects herself. “Er, not organic like ‘organically grown’ or anything. Just like, plants and animal products and stuff. Anything that was alive would work.”

Smiling at her fumbling I chime in, “Okay, so no eating rocks or crayons. Just like my mom taught me.”

“Actually,” Liz replies skeptically, “I’m pretty sure wax is organic? A Were could probably eat crayons.”

“My mother would be very upset with me if I told her that.” I jested. 

Liz snorted, which broke the dam on my own laughter as well. We both crumbled under a fit of giggles, powerless under their onslaught. It took some time for us to calm down, but the giggles did lessen eventually. 

Our eyes met in a very intense moment after I wiped an errant tear from my eye. Liz wore a wide smile aimed directly at me and it made my chest flutter, while doing nothing to the smile that threatened to make my cheeks sore. I couldn’t help admiring her smile or her eyes, going back and forth in a bid to figure out which one was more distracting.

Right as I came to the conclusion that both were dangerous, Liz reached out towards me. My heart must have stopped and I stood still as a statue, unable to anticipate what was about to happen.

“Here, let me get that for you.” Liz said while taking the plate I was holding and placing it on the rack of the dishwasher.

Needing to run a reboot and a system diagnostic on myself, all I managed to respond with was, “Oh uh, thanks.”

“Any time.” Liz beamed as the cutting boards also went onto the racks. With everything put away, Liz closed the dishwasher but didn’t start it. There would certainly be more this evening for dinner. 

“Now, “She continued, “What are we going to do next?”

“Well… I figure we should start getting your room put together?” I mumbled, not expecting to get the planning pinned onto me.

“Alright, sounds good to me.” She said with a grin.

Going on ahead of me, Liz headed toward the stairs. It took me a second to get my bearings, then I followed after her. We quickly made it up to her room and were met with a handful of boxes along the wall, as well as Liz’s bags which were against the opposite wall.

“Where to start…” Liz muttered.

“We should probably do the mattress first. That way it has more time to expand before bed time.” Memory foam wasn’t going to be finished expanding for a couple of days usually anyway, but the more time we give it the better I would think.

“Sure, I don’t see why not.” Liz affirmed.

And so, the two of us started tearing open some boxes. Before the mattress was the bed frame really. In place of a box spring we were going to have one of the collapsable frames that locked together to form a queen mattress base. That required almost no assembly, just a couple of wing nuts to tie the things together and it was ready. 

Up next was the mattress itself, which was really as simple as just taking it out of the box and then popping the sealed bag. We easily maneuvered it into place, then just had to wait for it to suck in enough air to more closely resemble a mattress.

With that task done, we moved on to the furniture. Liz claimed dibs on assembling the shelf while I got the nightstand. Now the two of us were sitting on the soft carpeted floor with an array of parts and instructions that more or less made sense.

This seemed like a pretty good opportunity for some questions. I was hoping to learn more about Liz as I asked, “So, what kinda stuff do you normally do when things aren’t all magical?”

As she was fitting some pegs into slots on what I was pretty sure was the side panel of the shelf Liz replied, “Mostly coursework. I’m doing a masters program in computer sciences.”

I winced, which I think Liz saw out of the corner of her eye. Before I could say anything she added, “It’s an online program. I can still do it from here just fine. In fact, while you are at work I’ll probably be doing work for my classes at that cafe or wherever I end up staying close to you.”

“Oh,” I gawked while having paused my work, “That’s pretty cool. What got you into computer science?”

Liz laughed to herself. Then, seeing my face turn to confusion she answered, “Well, what I usually have to say is that I just think the stuff is cool. How computers work, how they communicate, and all that normal stuff.” She briefly turned a smile that I couldn’t quite place towards me that made my cheeks color slightly. “I can actually tell someone besides my parents the full story now though. The real reason is because of the future.”

“The future?” I wondered aloud with a slight tilt of my head.

“Yeah, you remember what my mom said about Weres not aging?” Seeing me nod she went on, “So that’s the whole thing. I’m going to have to plan in the very long term, what with the whole not aging thing. So, what seems like a good investment of my time? Computers. Those things are weird. They are just a bunch of zeros and ones, but they can do so much. What can they do in a hundred years? More? I have no idea, but that is something that I feel like I need to know. If not now, then I at least want to understand it better later. Computers could take over the world someday, theoretically. Though unless they learn how to use magic it’s not really a problem. Someone with some powerful magic could beat a death machine any day.”

I openly stared, mouth agape. Holy shit, I did not expect that much knowledge dumping right now. That perspective is… a little wild. I could be there in a few hundred years watching witches fight giant robots. Liz could be fighting those robots too. Oh shit, I might have to fight the giant robots. Oh jeez, I think I’m gonna need a minute…

Seeing my ongoing internal meltdown, Liz stops working on the shelf and addresses me, “Sorry… I got a little carried away there.”

“That’s so cool…” I whispered to myself with an awestruck expression. Liz seemed to have heard it through as she froze up for a second.

“Is it?” She inquired. Perhaps to herself, but I heard and decided to say something anyway.

“Heck yeah it is!” I exclaimed maybe a bit too forcefully. I continued at a more reasonable volume, “I mean, that takes thinking ahead to a whole new level. You are learning about computers to prepare for a future where they are even more integrated into the world than they are now. Even if the future is super mundane and computers are just better but not really all that different, that would still be helpful. You’d be an expert that knew why things are like they are and how they came to be that way. That’s like, really really cool!”

My rant seems to have given the both of us pause. We both sat there in the middle of our respective piles of parts and manuals staring at each other with a unique mixture of surprise and… something?

Blushing now, Liz says, “Well uh, thanks. Like I said, I never got to tell anyone besides my parents. I was a little excited that I got to tell someone else…”

“Then thank you for trusting me with that.” I said with enthusiasm. “You can rest assured that your secret is safe with me.” I giggled at the notion, since we both shared the same secret anyway. Liz joined me laughing for a moment, then the room fell back into silence. 

It was another instance of us staring at each other, the air between us charged with something that I was very nervous to actually think about. Her eyes were just so damn pretty… That smile, a bit lopsided, was enchanting. The clear joy that she shared when she got to talk about her college program and her goals.

Fuck.

“We should… probably finish putting all of this together. There is a lot that I would like to cover before you go to work tomorrow.” Liz insisted, breaking the tense quiet that had settled over us.

I didn’t really have anything to say against that so I agreed, “Yeah, we probably should.” Even having said so, our gazes lingered on each other for another moment until Liz broke off first. 

For the time being, conversation halted between us as we focused on getting these darn things put together. Why do they have to make these instructions so much harder than they need to be? 

The only sounds in the room were the gentle thunks and tinks of furniture assembly and the shuffling of paper as we deciphered the cryptic instructions. Every once in a while, I got distracted by glancing at Liz and almost letting myself fall into a mental tangent. I persevered through, maintaining most of my attention on the task at hand. I did notice Liz similarly looking my way from time to time.

I feel like we have gotten a lot closer today. Day two of knowing her. Well, gotta start somewhere. Nothing brings people together quite like furniture assembly.

MegaSuperKami

Ah, laughter, thrills, and tears. This chapter is a nice little focus on Sam and Liz learning some more. Mostly Sam, but eh. She's behind on her studies. Especially her studies of Liz ;)

I hope you enjoyed the insight into a possible future of Werewolf versus Terminator. When that came up I thought it was pretty neat at least.

Once again, thank you very much for reading and I hope you have a hanondifferous day!